Privacy Policy

1What we don’t collect

So there is no ambiguity, we want to be explicit about what the app does not do:

• There is no account, login or registration. We never ask for your name, email address, phone number or date of birth.
• We run no crash-reporting service, and no analytics beyond the anonymous product statistics described in section 3.
• We operate no server of our own, and none of your notes, bookmarks or reading content is ever uploaded anywhere. The scripture text, translations and commentary are bundled inside the app and read offline.
• We do not access your contacts, photos, camera, microphone, files, calendar, or precise GPS location.
• We do not sell your personal information for money.

2Data stored on your device

The app saves the following locally, in your device’s private app storage, so it can remember where you were and what you saved:

This information is never transmitted to us or to anyone else. It is not backed up to any service we control. Note that if you have enabled your operating system’s own backup — Google’s Android Backup or Apple’s iCloud Backup — your device may include this app data in that backup under the terms of your Google or Apple account, which are outside our control.

3Usage analytics

The app uses Google Analytics for Firebase to understand how the app is used in aggregate — which chapters get opened, whether people return, which features go unused. This tells us where to spend effort. It is not used to build a profile of you, and there is no account for it to attach to.

What is recorded is limited to product usage:

• Screens you open, and events such as opening a chapter, reading a verse, saving a bookmark or note, changing language or theme, or sharing a verse.
• Search terms you type into the app's search, truncated to 80 characters.
• A randomly generated app-instance identifier, plus general device information — model, operating system version, language and country.

We do not send the text of your notes, the content of your bookmarks, or any name, email address or contact detail — the app never asks for those. Google processes this data as our service provider; see the Firebase Privacy and Security page and the Google Privacy Policy.

You can turn this off completely at Settings → Privacy → Usage analytics inside the app. Switching it off stops collection immediately.

4Advertising and Google AdMob

The app is free, and advertising is what pays for it. Ads are served by Google AdMob, a Google service. Formats used are banners, interstitials, app-open ads, native ads and optional rewarded ads.

To serve, cap, measure and secure those ads, Google collects and processes information from your device. Depending on your consent and platform settings, this may include:

• An advertising identifier — the Android Advertising ID (AAID) or, on iOS, the Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA) if you allow tracking.
• Your IP address, from which an approximate (city or region level) location can be inferred. The app does not request or use GPS.
• Device and app information — device model, operating system version, language, and the app’s identifier and version.
• Ad interaction data — that an ad was requested, shown, viewed or clicked, used for measurement and for detecting invalid traffic and fraud.

Google acts as an independent controller for this processing. Its handling of the data is governed by Google’s own terms, not ours:

• Google Privacy Policy
• How Google uses information from sites or apps that use its services
• AdMob and advertising partners

On iOS, the app also includes Apple’s SKAdNetwork identifiers, which allow advertisers to measure ad campaign performance in an aggregated, privacy-preserving way that does not identify you individually.

5Your privacy choices

You are in control of personalised advertising, and turning it off does not remove any app feature — you will simply see less relevant ads.

Usage analytics

Open Settings → Privacy → Usage analytics in the app and switch it off. This is a single toggle, takes effect immediately, and removes no functionality.

In the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom and Switzerland

The first time you open the app we show a consent form provided by Google’s User Messaging Platform, where you choose whether your data may be used for personalised advertising. Analytics is held back until you answer that form, and where the IAB Transparency & Consent Framework applies it additionally requires your consent to store and access information on your device. You can change your choice at any time from Settings → Privacy options inside the app.

On iOS

Apple’s App Tracking Transparency prompt asks your permission before the IDFA can be used. If you decline, ads are still shown but are not personalised using that identifier. You can change this later in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Tracking, or turn it off across all apps there.

On Android

Open Settings → Google → Ads to delete or reset your Advertising ID, or to opt out of ad personalisation entirely.

Residents of California and other US states

Using an advertising identifier to serve personalised ads may be treated as “sharing” personal information for cross-context behavioural advertising under the California Consumer Privacy Act (as amended by the CPRA) and similar state laws. We do not sell your personal information for money. To opt out of this sharing, use the platform controls described above, or email us at shreecodeinfo@gmail.com with the subject line “Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information”.

6Notifications

The app can send you an optional daily verse reminder. These notifications are generated entirely on your device — they are not push messages sent from a server, and no notification service receives your device token or any personal data from us.

Notifications are off unless you enable them, and you can turn them off at any time from the app’s Settings or from your operating system’s notification settings.

7Permissions we request

The app deliberately does not request permission to schedule exact alarms, which is reserved for alarm-clock and calendar apps. Your daily reminder is delivered approximately at the time you choose.

8Other third-party services

• Sharing. When you share a verse, the app hands the text to your operating system’s share sheet. What happens next is governed by whichever app you choose to share into. We receive nothing.
• App rating. If you rate the app, the request is handled by Google Play’s or Apple’s in-app review component. We never see your review or your identity through the app.
• External links. Links that open outside the app (for example our website) are subject to the privacy policy of the destination.

9Children’s privacy

The app is intended for a general audience and is not directed at children under 13 (or under 16 where a higher age applies). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

If you believe a child has provided personal information through the app, contact us at shreecodeinfo@gmail.com and we will act on it promptly.

10Retention and deletion

Because your bookmarks, notes, progress and settings never leave your device, we hold nothing to delete. You can remove this data yourself at any time:

• Delete individual bookmarks or notes inside the app.
• Clear the app’s storage from your device settings.
• Uninstall the app, which erases all of its local data permanently.

Advertising data held by Google is retained according to Google’s own retention schedule, described in the Google Privacy Policy linked above.

11Your rights

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, restrict or object to the processing of your personal data, to withdraw consent, and to lodge a complaint with your data protection authority.

In practice, because we hold no personal data about you on any server, most of these rights are exercised directly on your device or through the advertising controls in section 5. For anything else, or to reach Google about data it holds, start by emailing us at shreecodeinfo@gmail.com and we will help or point you to the right place.

• EEA / UK (GDPR): our lawful basis for advertising is your consent, collected through the Google consent form; for storing your settings and content on your device it is our legitimate interest in providing the app you asked for.
• India (Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023): you may contact us at the address above regarding any personal data concern.
• California (CCPA/CPRA): see the opt-out described in section 5. We will not discriminate against you for exercising any privacy right.

12International transfers

We do not transfer your data ourselves, since we do not receive it. Google, as the advertising provider, processes data on servers in a number of countries, including the United States, using the transfer safeguards described in the Google Privacy Policy.

13Security

Your app data is held in your device’s private application storage, protected by your operating system’s sandboxing and by your device passcode or biometric lock. Because we store nothing on our own systems, there is no central database of user content to breach.

No method of electronic storage is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security of data held on a device we do not control.

14Changes to this policy

If we change this policy we will revise the “Last updated” date at the top of this page and, for material changes, give notice in the app before the change takes effect. The current version is always published at shrimadbhagavadgita.shreecode.com.

15Contact us

Questions, requests or complaints about this policy are welcome.

• Email: shreecodeinfo@gmail.com
• Publisher: Shree Code
• Website: shreecode.com